Suzuki Slides Into Old Home With Winning Run

Ichiro Suzuki scored against his former team, the Seattle Mariners, on Sunday.Credit
Dan Levine/European Pressphoto Agency

SEATTLE — There may be no patches of grass and red dirt in the world that Ichiro Suzuki knows better than right field and the home-plate area at Safeco Field, where he performed so brilliantly for 12 seasons as a Seattle Mariners right fielder and hitter.

But on Sunday, at the conclusion of his first return trip to this emerald park as a Yankee, Suzuki looked as if he were treading on treacherous and unfamiliar ground. He slipped, slid, skidded and fell, and he even dropped a pop-up in foul territory that he guessed was only his second such drop in the major leagues.

Embarrassing, he called it. He even slipped and fell when he tried to get up after a successful slide across home plate in the ninth inning, on a plot of real estate he had trod on thousands of times as a Mariner. As clumsy as it looked, though, that play provided the Yankees with the winning run in their 2-1 victory over the Mariners, the Yankees’ sixth win in their last seven games.

“It was a tough day for me today,” said Suzuki, who was a Mariners star from 2001 until he was traded to the Yankees last year. “For me to be able to contribute in that way, to be able to score the winning run, was big.”

Suzuki was 0 for 3 going into his at-bat in the ninth with the score tied, 1-1, after starting pitchers David Phelps of the Yankees and Felix Hernandez of the Mariners kept the scoring to a minimum. Suzuki drew a leadoff walk against reliever Yoervis Medina, then went to second on a sacrifice bunt by Jayson Nix. Reid Brignac popped up for the second out, but Chris Stewart, in the midst of his best season, laced a ground-ball single through the hole on the left side of the infield.

The third-base coach, Rob Thomson, gave Suzuki the signal to go, and he chugged his 39-year-old body home and slid across the plate safe ahead of Raul Ibanez’s throw up the first-base line.

In his exuberance after scoring, Suzuki slipped and stumbled on his backside before regaining his balance and jogging safely into the dugout to receive the congratulations of his teammates.

Mariano Rivera took care of the rest, allowing three base runners in the ninth but getting Michael Saunders to hit a shallow fly to left fielder Vernon Wells for the final out, stranding runners on first and second. The save was Rivera’s 23rd in 24 opportunities.

Brett Gardner went 4 for 5 with a double and knocked in a run. Mark Teixeira went 0 for 5 with four strikeouts, but he made an agile play in the ninth after Kyle Seager extended his hitting streak to 13 games with a single to lead off the inning.

With the Yankees clinging to their one-run lead, Kendrys Morales hit a grounder to first. Teixeira scooped it up, stepped on first base and then fired a strike to Brignac, the shortstop, who applied the tag on Seager.

Ichiro was not so smooth. In the seventh inning, Ibanez hit a shallow foul pop-up. Suzuki ran a long way to get it, but as he settled under the ball, it hit his glove and somehow popped out. He desperately tried to catch the rebound, but the ball exceeded his reach, and he ended up sprawled on his belly as the crowd that once cheered his every play roared at the strange blooper.

Fans in Seattle saw Suzuki regularly rap out 200 hits a season and provide the most reliable outfield play. But as he approaches his 40th birthday in October, his batting average has dipped to .259, and his speed chasing down balls is not what it once was.

Suzuki could recall only one other such flub, on a ball hit by Casey Blake, formerly of the Cleveland Indians, and he could not recall whether Blake eventually scored. Ibanez ended his at-bat by striking out against Boone Logan, so the only problem for Suzuki was injured pride in front of his old fans.

“That doesn’t happen very often,” he said through his interpreter. “But as a professional, as someone who takes pride in what they do, it is embarrassing.”

Yankees Manager Joe Girardi said: “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Ich drop a ball, and I don’t know if I ever will again. It’s like, oh my gosh, that just happened.”

An inning later, on Alex Liddi’s double, the ball eluded Suzuki’s reach, and he skidded on the dirt as he tried to instantly change direction to get the bouncing ball.

So much sliding, skidding and falling is so unusual for Suzuki that he was asked by a reporter if he needed new spikes. Sitting in a squatting position on his chair after the game, Suzuki reminded the reporter that he wore new spikes for every game, then patted him on the shoulder, smiled, and said in English, “Don’t you worry about it.”

With their West Coast trip having started with three wins in four games, the Yankees were certainly not worried about anything.

A version of this article appears in print on June 10, 2013, on page D3 of the New York edition with the headline: Slipping Star Slides Into Old Home With Winning Run in the Ninth. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe